"LA's Radical Culture Was Powerful and Prevalent"

"It moves seamlessly between civil rights and Black Power, anti-war protests, gay liberation, women's liberation, alternative media, the Brown Berets and the Chicano Moratorium, student strikes, the free clinic movement, Asian American radicalism, and the citywide struggle against police brutality. All these movements shared a desire for freedom—freedom of movement and mobility; freedom to access public space; freedom to live and work anywhere; freedom to determine their own education, health, and sexuality; freedom to write, perform, and make art; and freedom from economic precarity and war—at home and abroad. And at times, Davis and Wiener show, LA's insurgent movements were winning, challenging the state’s legitimacy and thus driving it to rely on force to maintain control."

At Boston Review, Robin D.G. Kelley reviews Mike Davis and Jon Wiener's Set the Night on Fire: L.A. in the Sixties.